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  <div class="section" id="string-services">
<span id="stringservices"></span><h1>7. String Services<a class="headerlink" href="#string-services" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h1>
<p>The modules described in this chapter provide a wide range of string
manipulation operations.</p>
<p>In addition, Python&#8217;s built-in string classes support the sequence type
methods described in the <a class="reference internal" href="stdtypes.html#typesseq"><em>Sequence Types &#8212; str, unicode, list, tuple, bytearray, buffer, xrange</em></a> section, and also the
string-specific methods described in the <a class="reference internal" href="stdtypes.html#string-methods"><em>String Methods</em></a> section.
To output formatted strings use template strings or the <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">%</span></tt> operator
described in the <a class="reference internal" href="stdtypes.html#string-formatting"><em>String Formatting Operations</em></a> section. Also, see the
<a class="reference internal" href="re.html#module-re" title="re: Regular expression operations."><tt class="xref py py-mod docutils literal"><span class="pre">re</span></tt></a> module for string functions based on regular expressions.</p>
<div class="toctree-wrapper compound">
<ul>
<li class="toctree-l1"><a class="reference internal" href="string.html">7.1. <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">string</span></tt> &#8212; Common string operations</a><ul>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="string.html#string-constants">7.1.1. String constants</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="string.html#string-formatting">7.1.2. String Formatting</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="string.html#format-string-syntax">7.1.3. Format String Syntax</a><ul>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="string.html#format-specification-mini-language">7.1.3.1. Format Specification Mini-Language</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="string.html#format-examples">7.1.3.2. Format examples</a></li>
</ul>
</li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="string.html#template-strings">7.1.4. Template strings</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="string.html#string-functions">7.1.5. String functions</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="string.html#deprecated-string-functions">7.1.6. Deprecated string functions</a></li>
</ul>
</li>
<li class="toctree-l1"><a class="reference internal" href="re.html">7.2. <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">re</span></tt> &#8212; Regular expression operations</a><ul>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="re.html#regular-expression-syntax">7.2.1. Regular Expression Syntax</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="re.html#module-contents">7.2.2. Module Contents</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="re.html#regular-expression-objects">7.2.3. Regular Expression Objects</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="re.html#match-objects">7.2.4. Match Objects</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="re.html#examples">7.2.5. Examples</a><ul>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="re.html#checking-for-a-pair">7.2.5.1. Checking For a Pair</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="re.html#simulating-scanf">7.2.5.2. Simulating scanf()</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="re.html#search-vs-match">7.2.5.3. search() vs. match()</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="re.html#making-a-phonebook">7.2.5.4. Making a Phonebook</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="re.html#text-munging">7.2.5.5. Text Munging</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="re.html#finding-all-adverbs">7.2.5.6. Finding all Adverbs</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="re.html#finding-all-adverbs-and-their-positions">7.2.5.7. Finding all Adverbs and their Positions</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="re.html#raw-string-notation">7.2.5.8. Raw String Notation</a></li>
</ul>
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</li>
<li class="toctree-l1"><a class="reference internal" href="struct.html">7.3. <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">struct</span></tt> &#8212; Interpret strings as packed binary data</a><ul>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="struct.html#functions-and-exceptions">7.3.1. Functions and Exceptions</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="struct.html#format-strings">7.3.2. Format Strings</a><ul>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="struct.html#byte-order-size-and-alignment">7.3.2.1. Byte Order, Size, and Alignment</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="struct.html#format-characters">7.3.2.2. Format Characters</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="struct.html#examples">7.3.2.3. Examples</a></li>
</ul>
</li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="struct.html#classes">7.3.3. Classes</a></li>
</ul>
</li>
<li class="toctree-l1"><a class="reference internal" href="difflib.html">7.4. <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">difflib</span></tt> &#8212; Helpers for computing deltas</a><ul>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="difflib.html#sequencematcher-objects">7.4.1. SequenceMatcher Objects</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="difflib.html#sequencematcher-examples">7.4.2. SequenceMatcher Examples</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="difflib.html#differ-objects">7.4.3. Differ Objects</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="difflib.html#differ-example">7.4.4. Differ Example</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="difflib.html#a-command-line-interface-to-difflib">7.4.5. A command-line interface to difflib</a></li>
</ul>
</li>
<li class="toctree-l1"><a class="reference internal" href="stringio.html">7.5. <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">StringIO</span></tt> &#8212; Read and write strings as files</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l1"><a class="reference internal" href="stringio.html#module-cStringIO">7.6. <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">cStringIO</span></tt> &#8212; Faster version of <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">StringIO</span></tt></a></li>
<li class="toctree-l1"><a class="reference internal" href="textwrap.html">7.7. <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">textwrap</span></tt> &#8212; Text wrapping and filling</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l1"><a class="reference internal" href="codecs.html">7.8. <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">codecs</span></tt> &#8212; Codec registry and base classes</a><ul>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="codecs.html#codec-base-classes">7.8.1. Codec Base Classes</a><ul>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="codecs.html#codec-objects">7.8.1.1. Codec Objects</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="codecs.html#incrementalencoder-objects">7.8.1.2. IncrementalEncoder Objects</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="codecs.html#incrementaldecoder-objects">7.8.1.3. IncrementalDecoder Objects</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="codecs.html#streamwriter-objects">7.8.1.4. StreamWriter Objects</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="codecs.html#streamreader-objects">7.8.1.5. StreamReader Objects</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="codecs.html#streamreaderwriter-objects">7.8.1.6. StreamReaderWriter Objects</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="codecs.html#streamrecoder-objects">7.8.1.7. StreamRecoder Objects</a></li>
</ul>
</li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="codecs.html#encodings-and-unicode">7.8.2. Encodings and Unicode</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="codecs.html#standard-encodings">7.8.3. Standard Encodings</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="codecs.html#python-specific-encodings">7.8.4. Python Specific Encodings</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="codecs.html#module-encodings.idna">7.8.5. <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">encodings.idna</span></tt> &#8212; Internationalized Domain Names in Applications</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="codecs.html#module-encodings.utf_8_sig">7.8.6. <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">encodings.utf_8_sig</span></tt> &#8212; UTF-8 codec with BOM signature</a></li>
</ul>
</li>
<li class="toctree-l1"><a class="reference internal" href="unicodedata.html">7.9. <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">unicodedata</span></tt> &#8212; Unicode Database</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l1"><a class="reference internal" href="stringprep.html">7.10. <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">stringprep</span></tt> &#8212; Internet String Preparation</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l1"><a class="reference internal" href="fpformat.html">7.11. <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">fpformat</span></tt> &#8212; Floating point conversions</a></li>
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